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UNITED STATES PATENT OFFICE.

ROBERT D. DW'YER, OF NEWV YORK, N. Y., ASSIGNOR TO ABRAHAM B. SANDS I AND DAVID SANDS.

IMPROVEMENT IN MANUFACTURE OF LINT.

Specification forming part of Letters Patent No. 24,970, dated August 2, 1859.

To all whom it may cbncern:

Be it known that 1, ROBERT D. DWYER, of New York, county of New York, and State of New York, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Making Lint for Surgical Uses; and I do hereby declare that the following is a full, clear, and exact description of the same.

My invention or discovery is of a new mode of preparing surgical lint, constituting an improved art or manufacture.

The only method by which the article lint has been heretofore produced was by scraping, entirely by hand, old linen cloth with a knife into said lint, after which it was spun and woven, so as to produce an absorbent cloth suitable for application to sores and wounds, as well known. This mode of production is not only very costly, but the quantity which may be produced is so limited. as to be below the amount which is desired for use. By my process the lint may be obtained directly from the flax to any extent and possessed of all the characteristics required. Neither cotton, silk, nor indeed any fibrous material other than fiax has been found to possess the properties necessary for the manufacture of this article-that is to say, a material capable of being reduced to a fine fiber, having softness and pliability, and which, under such conditions, will still be capable of absorbing fluids to the degree and in the manner required in its application to wounds and sores, whereby the enlargement of the suppurating-surface is prevented and the eonsequent increase of the inflammation obviated. Old linen attains this condition by reason of the wear and usage arising from the repeated washings, rubbings, &c., the fiber becoming thereby broken and readily separable into lint by scraping, as above mentioned.

By my method of treating flax I am enabled to bring it into the same condition as lint formed in the usual way from old linen. My process is as follows: The flax is first to be out into suitable lengths, which may be pieces of an inch, more or less, by any suitable knife or chopper. Such as are used for cutting hay will answer. This is then to be soaked in wa ter of a temperature not to exceed 70 Fahrenheit for some eight or ten hours, and in 2 wooden tub or other vessel of a non-corrosiw character. From this vessel it is taken ant submitted to a breaker, which may be of corrugated or toothed rollers, the corrugation: meshing into one another. The passing of Elk flax between these breaks all the joints and crushes the tubes. After this it is to be steamec' in a condenser or closed vessel, for the purpose of softening it and setting free the oil then again subjected to the action of the rollers and these processes are to be continued alter nately until all the oil is discharged. VVher thoroughly broken and purified in this re spect, the product is to be submitted to 131k action of a solution of lye of'wood-ashes at 2 temperature of 120 Fahrenheit for ten hours or thereabout. Afterward it is washed, witl constant agitation, in a stream of clear water and then immersed in a bath of dilute pyro ligneous acid, which brings the material int a condition for bleaching. This will be ef fected by means of a saturated solution i1 equal quantities of chloride of sodium am chloride of lime applied in the usual way 0 bleaching fibrous materials. It is then to b washed for six hours in a clear stream unde: horizontal agitation and at a temperature 0 110 Fahrenheit, gradually diminishing to 60 Fahrenheit at the close. After this the mate rial is to be dried between steam-heated roll ers, and then carded, spun, and woven, as i usual with hand-scraped lint.

I claim The new article of manufacture herein de scribed, being surgeons lint produced directl; from new flax, in the manner substantially a set forth.

In testimony whereof Ihave hereunto set 111; hand.

ROBERT D. DWYER.

Witnesses:

J. P. Prnssoiv, S. M. llIAYNARD. 

